Years ago, I found myself sitting in law school in Moot Court wearing an oversized itchy blue suit. It was a horrible experience. In a desperate attempt to avoid anything like that in the future I enrolled in a tax course. I loved it. I signed up for another. Before I knew it, in addition to my JD, I had a LL.M Taxation. I needed only to don my cape…. taxgirl® was born. Today, I live and work in Philadelphia, PA, one of the best cities in the world (I can't even complain about the sports teams these days). I landed in the City of Brotherly Love by way of Temple University School of Law. While at law school, I interned at the estates attorney division of the IRS. At IRS, I participated in the review and audit of federal estate tax returns. I even took the lead on a successful audit. At audit, opposing counsel read my report, looked at his file and said, “Gentlemen, she’s exactly right.” I nearly fainted. It was a short jump from there to practicing, teaching, writing and breathing tax.

The American public expects the Internal Revenue Service to be apolitical in its enforcement of our tax laws. News that the agency admits it targeted American taxpayers based on politics is both astounding and appalling. The Committee on Ways and Means will get to the bottom of this practice and ensure it never takes place again.

The American people must have the fullest confidence that organizations requesting tax exemption receive completely unbiased treatment from the Internal Revenue Service and are never singled out by name or political views. The nation deserves a complete understanding of this matter, and as Chairman Camp and I discussed this morning, it is essential that there be a thorough and bipartisan investigation and effective remedial action.”

The timing of the hearing was clearly political. The fact that Congress was beating down the doors for IRS to testify meant that it was going to be scheduled quickly: with about four days’ notice, there was not a lot of time for either side to prepare (though, really, why bother with facts?). It also meant that the process is likely to be finished quickly, not at all like the extended hearings for Bush’s “Lawyergate” or Clinton’s impeachment. That’s likely a relief for the Obama administration (as well as Acting Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service Steve Miller, who is on his way out).

Steve Miller, and the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA), J. Russell George, were the only scheduled witnesses at the hearing. Just prior to the hearing, Miller offered these opening remarks:

Thank you for the opportunity to be here today. Unfortunately, given time considerations, the IRS was unable to prepare written testimony. I would note that I have a very brief statement before I take your questions.

First and foremost, as Acting Commissioner, I want to apologize on behalf of the Internal Revenue Service for the mistakes that we made and the poor service we provided. The affected organizations and the American public deserve better.

Partisanship or even the perception of partisanship has no place at the IRS. It cannot even appear to be a consideration in determining the tax exemption of an organization.

I do not believe that partisanship motivated the people who engaged in the practices described in the Treasury Inspector General’s report. I have reviewed the Treasury Inspector General’s report, and I believe its conclusions are consistent with that. I think that what happened here was that foolish mistakes were made by people trying to be more efficient in their workload selection. The listing described in the report, while intolerable, was a mistake and not an act of partisanship.

The agency is moving forward. It has learned its lesson. We have previously worked to correct issues in the processing of the cases described in the report and have implemented changes to make sure that this type of thing never happens again. Now that TIGTA has completed its fact-finding and issued its report, management will take appropriate action with respect to those responsible.

Miller maintained, as he had previously, that an increase in the number of organizations applying for nonprofit status contributed to a change in the IRS tax exempt application review process. He also insisted that the review was not political and “included groups from across the political spectrum.” He shrugged off accusations that he had lied to Congress, saying that he had answered their questions truthfully, including those posed in July 2012 while Doug Shulman was still in charge at IRS.

That wasn’t enough for some on the Hill who clearly feel that Miller is getting off easy. Specifically Rep. Tom Reed (R-NY) chastised Miller, saying that “[n]othing bad is going to happen to you, you’re going to get your full benefits.” Miller, who resigned in the middle of the scandal, shot back: “Nothing bad is happening to me, Congressman?” He advised, when asked about his resignation, that “I resigned because as the acting commissioner, what happens in the IRS, whether I was personally involved or not, stopped at my desk.”

Congress is clearly walking a line between wanting to learn more (good) and exploiting those holes for political gain (not so good). There is, however, always the very real possibility that politicians on both sides of the aisle could experience some backlash as a result with the public getting increasingly weary over coverage of the next big scandal. It is entirely possible to have too much of a good thing.

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